Part 30 (2/2)
”But this is Friday.”
”Today is Thursday, sir.”
I tried to smile. ”I'm sorry. Of course it is. When is the next plane to Mexico City?”
”Six thirty tomorrow morning.”
”I would like a seat.”
”We are closed, as I already said.”
I lifted a finger. ”One moment, please.”
Turning my back to her, I lifted my s.h.i.+rttail and slipped my hand beneath my trousers. I withdrew the slender envelope and took out some cash. I faced her again and put two fifty-dollar bills on the counter.
”That is for your trouble,” I said. ”And how much is the ticket?”
She glanced quickly left and right and then slipped the bills into her purse. Moving to the computer, she started tapping b.u.t.tons on the keyboard. ”I can get you on it for another two thousand seven hundred and twenty quetzals.”
I spent a long night in the waiting area at the gate on the black-leather-and-stainless-steel seating at the unexpectedly modern La Aurora International Airport. I tried not to imagine what would have happened if I had lost control of my mind in the mountains or in the van with Vega instead of while I was alone with Emilio Delarosa. I watched the few people wandering beneath the crisscrossed steel trusses over the concourses and wondered if any of them had followed me. Mostly they were airport employees, janitors, and security. A guard entered the restroom, and I had the crazy idea of following him and taking his gun.
At one point, around three in the morning, a man with a thin beard and military boots came into the area where I was waiting. He sat down a few rows away from me. I stood up and walked to another gate.
When I walked off the AeroMexico flight in Mexico City the next morning, I realized that some of my dizziness might not be due to the damage in my head. It had been more than a day since my last meal. I found a snack shop and gorged on two prepackaged sandwiches and a bag of potato chips. Then I went looking for a ticket to Tijuana.
The Mexico City airport was enormous. By the time I found the correct ticket counter, it felt as if I had already walked halfway to the US border. It turned out that in stopping for a meal, I had missed my chance to board the only morning flight. I wandered through the airport for nine hours, waiting for the next one.
It was dark again when we touched down in Tijuana. The rental car was waiting where I had left it in the parking garage. I tried to remember how long ago that had been, but the days and nights had merged together.
I walked past the car along the driveway. I followed the curve up and up until I found a Ford Taurus with California plates parked beside a van. It looked as if the van blocked the line of sight from the nearest security camera. I knelt and used the flat tongue of my belt buckle to remove the plates. I carried them back to the rental car, got in, and drove to the exit. There, I handed the parking chit to the man in the booth and paid the amount that flashed on the small screen. When he handed me a receipt, I checked the date printed there and saw it had been four days.
On a side street several blocks away from the airport, I parked at the curb, got out, and switched the plates. I threw the rental plates onto a pile of trash bags and drove on. I found an OXXO convenience store and pulled over. I went in and bought a blue-and-silver Dallas Cowboys gimme cap, a pair of full-frame reading gla.s.ses from a revolving stand that also displayed sungla.s.ses, and the fattest cigar they had. I also bought another prepackaged sandwich, some more chips, and a bottle of tea for the caffeine.
Ten minutes later I pulled to the end of the half-mile-long line at the border crossing and settled in to wait. There were five or six other lanes of cars, thousands of us inching toward the USA while people strolled between the lanes selling ceramic turtles, sodas, deep-fried pastries called churros, bags of peanuts, chewing gun, and pinatas in all shapes.
It took two hours to roll that last half mile to the border. When only two vehicles remained between me and the US Customs booth, I put on the reading gla.s.ses and the gimme cap. I also unwrapped the cigar and stuck it in my mouth, pus.h.i.+ng it back so it filled out my cheek on the left side, where the customs cameras that were focused on drivers would be.
The car in front of me moved on. The light turned green. I rolled up to the customs booth.
”Pa.s.sport and driver's license, please,” said the border guard.
I handed them to him.
”Where have you been today, Mr. Carver?” asked the guard.
I did my best to talk around the cigar. ”Down at Ensenada. I was looking at a little condo.”
”You planning to buy?”
”Thinking about it.”
”You know about the drug cartels, don't you?”
”Yeah. But the place is cheap. Sides, I figure they won't bother me if I don't bother them.”
The guard shook his head. He compared my open pa.s.sport to something on the computer screen beside him in the booth. He said, ”Do you have any fruits or vegetable products with you?”
”No, sir.”
”Where are you from?”
”Originally, Salina, Kansas, but I live in LA now.”
He stared hard at me. I chewed on the cigar and waited.
He closed the pa.s.sport and gave it back to me, along with the driver's license. ”You should think a little more about that condo, Mr. Carver. These cartels down here aren't fooling around.”
”Thanks,” I said, taking the doc.u.ments. ”I will.”
An hour and a half later, I pulled off the highway in San Clemente and pa.s.sed a gas station with a pay phone. I wasn't carrying a cell phone. Cell-phone locations can be traced. I drove a little farther to park the car out of the gas station's camera range and then got out and walked back to the phone. I called Teru and told him where I was. I dropped the cap and gla.s.ses and cigar in a Dumpster beside the station, then walked back to the car, got inside, and went to sleep.
Sometime later I awoke to the sound of Teru tapping on the driver's-side window. I put the rental-car keys behind the visor, got out, locked the door, and closed it.
When we were in Teru's Porsche, he said, ”So?”
”Remind me to call the rental people tomorrow about where we left that car.”
”Did you find Vega?”
”He found me.”
”And?”
”I'm not completely sure yet.”
I told him everything that had happened.
When I was done, he said, ”I still don't know what's going on, do you?”
”Maybe it'll make more sense after I've had some sleep.”
The next morning I woke up thinking about being served Simon's french roast coffee in bed, but apparently now that Sid Gold was in residence, my days of being b.u.t.tled were over. I made my own coffee. I heated a couple of frozen waffles, spread some b.u.t.ter on them, and smothered them in maple syrup, and then took them and the coffee outside to the patio. When I was done eating, I promised myself to start paying more attention to my diet. Then, since the police search had left the guesthouse in a shambles and Simon had done nothing about it, I spent several hours putting everything back in place. It was a hard thing, not being b.u.t.tled, but it was better to have been b.u.t.tled and lost, than never to have been b.u.t.tled at all.
Simon dropped by around noon with a large brown paper sack in his hands. We had lunch together on the patio. From the paper sack he withdrew Cobb salad and tomato bisque, a couple of chilled bottles of Perrier, and yet another M11 semiautomatic. Simon had used maple-smoked bacon in the salad, and Bleu de Gex instead of Roquefort cheese. He told me Sid Gold was going to work out fine. Even his children seemed all right, although with teenagers, you could never tell.
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